Magic Johnson was a very concerned man following the Los Angeles Lakers’ first-round exit from the 2024 playoffs at the hands of the Denver Nuggets. Johnson took to X to share some problems for the Lakers moving forward, with one being Victor Wembanyama and his San Antonio Spurs.
“Laker Nation, we have a problem. All the good teams in the West are young and talented: the Nuggets, the Timberwolves, the Thunder, and the Mavs. And the BIGGEST elephant in the room is the Spurs, who with Victor Wembanyama, will definitely be a playoff team next season. For the Lakers to compete with all these teams, the roster MUST improve.”
Johnson had a lot more to say about the Lakers’ exit and his posts ended up appearing on the Stephen A. Smith Show. While Smith went through this particular post from Johnson, he couldn’t believe that the Lakers icon thinks that the Spurs will make playoffs.
“I think Magic Johnson needs to be drug tested on that last part,” Smith said. “Spurs are not making the playoffs next season. Not that soon.”
(starts at 6:35 mark):
I think Johnson saying the Spurs will definitely be a playoff team was a bit much. Do they have an outside chance? Maybe, depending on who they manage to bring in during this offseason.
If you look at the Western Conference, I can only see two teams being bad next season: the Utah Jazz, if they go for a rebuild, and the Portland Trail Blazers. Everyone else I think has a shot at winning close to 40 games, which is ridiculous. With how stacked the conference is, I would predict the Spurs, who finished with a 22-60 record this season, will just miss out on the postseason in 2025.
As for Wembanyama, I fully expect him to be an All-Star next season and he might well be an All-NBA player as well. The 20-year-old averaged 21.4 points, 10.6 rebounds, 3.9 assists, 1.2 steals, and 3.6 blocks per game in 2023-24 as a rookie and I would back him to improve across the board.
Wembanyama revealed some players have already contacted him to team up, and it will be interesting to see if any big name ends up in San Antonio in the near future.
Magic Johnson Sent Out An Apology To Lakers Nation
Getting back to Magic, in one of those posts on X, he rather surprisingly claimed that load management was why the Lakers ended up in the Play-In Tournament.
“The Lakers have nobody but themselves to blame. They wouldn’t have been in the play-in game or finished as a 7th seed this season if they hadn’t lost too many games because of load management.”
Considering LeBron James, Anthony Davis, Austin Reaves, and D’Angelo Russell all played over 70 games each in the regular season, that was a bit of an odd statement. The 64-year-old soon realized that as well, as Magic apologized to Lakers Nation for his load management comment.
Johnson then claimed that injuries were the problem for LA in 2023-24. The Lakers did have some of their role players miss time this season, but when you consider that the big names were relatively healthy, as I mentioned earlier, I don’t think injuries can be an excuse.
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